Behavioral health workers picket Kaiser’s facilities over patient access to care
Behavioral health clinicians rallied Monday outside Kaiser Permanente’s Sacramento Medical Center on Morse Avenue, demanding their employer speed up follow-up appointments for patients, as part of a weeklong strike that will affect more than 100 of the health care giant’s facilities statewide.
More than 4,000 members of the National Union of Healthcare Workers say the strike is their attempt to compel Kaiser to commit to parity between behavioral health patients and physical health patients, but company leaders said the company is providing excellent mental health care despite a nationwide shortage of behavioral health providers.
“Our mental health care is rated among the best in the state and we’re very proud of the mental health care that we provide, and we want to get this contract settled and get back to the table, working with our mental health workers on continuously improving our care,” said Sandy Sharon, Kaiser’s area manager for Sacramento.
Kaiser Permanente Northern and Southern California health plans are the only plans in the state to receive five stars, the highest possible rating, for overall clinical effectiveness in behavioral and mental health care, according to the annual Health Care Quality Report Card from the California Office of the Patient Advocate.
Kenneth Rogers, a Kaiser psychologist in Elk Grove, serves on NUHW’s bargaining team. He said that Kaiser has “the best mental health care in the state when you’re able to see your provider. When you don’t have to wait four, six and eight weeks to see the same provider you’ve been working with, we have excellent care.
“We’re very good at what we do, but there’s not enough of us, and there isn’t enough resources for the patients that are coming in.”
Kaiser patients do not have quite so many hurdles when seeking treatment for physical maladies, said Susan Whitney, a Kaiser therapist in Kern County.
“I know of nowhere else but in the Kaiser system that there is literally no definition of a caseload or maximum number of patients for which one is responsible,” Whitney said. “There are about 35 therapists and social workers that serve Kaiser’s Kern County population of 109,000 members, only one mental health worker for every 3,000 members. In contrast, Kaiser primary care physicians have a panel, or caseload, of 1,500 patients, and also have staff such as nurses and medical assistants that support them.”
Kaiser has been negotiating with NUHW for more than a year, Sharon said, and the company has made a strong proposal of salaries and benefits. The company also is proposing a large education fund to increase the number of mental health workers, she said, to help alleviate the current shortage.
Over the past year, the union has documented stories of more than 1,000 Kaiser patients who are struggling to access mental health care and union officials said several of the members will attend rallies this week. Those stories are posted at the website KaiserDontDeny.org.
“When I had a severe panic attack, Kaiser told me there would be a one-month wait to see a therapist,” said Jocelyn Combs, a Kaiser patient in Pleasanton. “At one point, I refused to leave the lobby until Kaiser helped me find a therapist, but the appointments were so infrequent, I eventually realized that I had to go outside Kaiser and pay for weekly therapy.”
A little more than 80 percent of NUHW members voted to authorize strikes against the company, and roughly 88 percent rejected Kaiser’s contract offer because they said it did not do enough to alleviate wait times or provide enough time for therapists to do the follow-up work required for each patient.
NUHW had planned this week’s strike for November but postponed it following the unexpected death of Kaiser CEO Bernard Tyson.
About 24 clinicians protested early Monday morning outside Kaiser’s Morse Avenue medical center. It is one of about 10 sites around the site where picketing occurred.
Locally, picketers will rally outside the Roseville Medical Center, 1600 Eureka Road, on Wednesday; and at the South Sacramento Medical Center, 6600 Bruceville Road, on Friday. On Thursday, they will rally at the State Capitol at 10th and L streets at 10:30 a.m. and at the Department of Managed Health Care, 990 Ninth St., at 11:30 a.m.
Elsewhere in the Central Valley, pickets will be at Fresno Medical Center, 7300 N. Fresno St., daily through Friday.
Despite the strike, Sharon said, all of Kaiser’s hospitals and medical office buildings are open for business, and anybody needing care can access care.
This story was originally published December 16, 2019 at 10:25 AM with the headline "Behavioral health workers picket Kaiser’s facilities over patient access to care."
